Report finds cities misuse land grant fees

By Lydia Chen  |   2008-6-4  |     ONLINE EDITION

GOVERNMENTS in 11 major cities, including Beijing and Shanghai, were found to have misused a total of 8.4 billion yuan (US$1.2 billion) from land grant fees, the National Audit Office said today.

Among the misused funds, 5.24 billion yuan was spent on construction or renovation of government buildings while 3.14 billion yuan was loaned or used for investments, Qu Aicai, a senior official with the ministry said in a report posted on the ministry's Website today.

The audit, which was carried out last year, covered land grant records from 2004 to 2006 in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Chongqing, Harbin, Hefei, Jinan, Changsha, Guangzhou, Nanning and Chengdu.

The governments in Tianjin, Changsha, Nanning, Chengdu, Harbin, Shanghai, Hefei, Guangzhou and Jinan illegally offered discounts of 4.8 billion yuan on land grant fees to investors and some even gave state-owned land for free to attract investments, Qu said.

Separately, 17.33 billion yuan of land grant fees remained unpaid from land users in Chongqing, Nanning, Harbin, Jinan, Shanghai, Chengdu, Hefei, Changsha and Guangzhou, Qu added.

The 11 cities lent a total of 86,773.34 hectares of state-owned land by the end of 2006, which earned a combined income of 261.87 billion yuan, according to Qu.

By the end of January this year, 6.83 billion yuan of unclaimed fees and loans had been returned to the 11 city governments, Qu added.

The ministry also spot-checked 38 land projects in the cities, which included 64 communities in rural areas that provided land to investors.

The rural communities received total relocation compensation of 2.01 billion yuan, 89.77 percent of 2.23 billion yuan that was supposed to be paid, Qu said.

About 97.81 percent of farmers who gave up their land and homes received compensation, totaling 82.54 billion yuan, Qu said.